This week’s Republican convention is going to suggest, repeatedly not to say incessantly, that the GOP of 2000 is a new and different Republican party, led by a different kind of Republican. This isn’t an unreasonable point, and we wish George W. Bush well in conveying it. After all, a certain amount of distancing from the Newtled GOP of the 1990’s is prudent and desirable. And the failure of Bob Dole’s nostalgic acceptance speech in 1996 suggests the wisdom of looking forward rather than back, of stressing the new rather than the old.
This forward-looking disposition will probably be reinforced by the Democratic attack on Dick Cheney’s congressional votes last week, which seemed to suggest that there is something disreputable in his having been a Reagan Republican in the 1980s. The Bush campaign will understandably try to change the subject rather than get bogged down in Capitol Hill minutiae of a quarter century ago.
Still, it seems an appropriate moment to note that those who voted for, supported, and worked for Republican causes and Republican administrations of the past quarter century have much to be proud of. On the big issues, they were right. Too often, too many Democrats were wrong.
When Gerald Ford tried to prevent South Vietnam and Cambodia from falling to the Communists in 1975, he was right and the Democratic Congress was wrong — tragically wrong.
When Ronald Reagan cut taxes, broke the air traffic controllers strike, and deregulated energy, he launched the economic boom of the last two decades; when George Bush took the hit and worked out the savings and loan crisis, he sustained that boom. A second Carter or a Mondale or a Dukakis administration would have left this country less prosperous, and without the supple and productive economy that is today the envy of the world.
When Ronald Reagan built up the military, insisted on deploying intermediate range missiles in Europe, announced his intention to begin a strategic defense initiative, called the Soviet empire evil, and supported freedom fighters in Nicaragua, he led us to victory in the Cold War and liberated hundreds of millions of souls from communism. It is not polite to say so, but everybody knows that if the Democrats had defeated Reagan, Soviet tyranny might well still exist.
When George Bush went to war in the Persian Gulf, he laid the groundwork for a peaceful and stable 1990’s. Most Democrats in Congress opposed him.
Nor should Republicans hang their heads over their record later in the 1990s. The millennium was not ushered in by the election of 1994, but the new Republican Congress made a real contribution not just to our economic but to our social well being by insisting on balancing the budget and on welfare reform. Meanwhile, Republican governors and mayors reduced crime and improved the quality of civic life. Democrats at first objected to, then acquiesced in, and finally took credit for these Republican achievements.
When the Republican-controlled House of Representatives impeached President Clinton, it stood courageously against political pressure and for the rule of law. Democrats, with few exceptions, supported their dishonorable president.
And finally, lest we forget, Republicans for the past quarter century have defended the unborn and the traditional family despite gales of abuse from the media and the cultural elite. Here, too, the party has stood for decency and moral equality, and refused to join the Democrats in succumbing to, not to say embracing, the superficially attractive yet destructive trends of the age.
Do Republicans have nothing to be ashamed of, nothing to regret, nothing they couldn’t have done much better? Of course not. Have Republicans sometimes been cocky, sometimes cowardly, sometimes disingenuous, sometimes foolish? Sure. Do Republicans need to rethink some things, to come to grips with new conditions, even to engage in some creative destruction? Absolutely.
But, compared with political parties through history, the Republican party of the past quarter century has more than a defensible record. It has an honorable one. It deserves a tip of the hat even from the new, different, and (one hopes) improved GOP that will be on display this week in Philadelphia.
William Kristol
